Navid Kermani has emerged as a major public intellectual in Germany, raising the nation's conscience particularly on questions of immigration and religious tolerance. Born in Siegen, Germany, as the son of Iranian parents, Kermani is an author of literary works and of essays, as well as a scholar of religion. He studied “Orientalistik” (Near Eastern Studies), philosophy, and drama in Cologne, Cairo, and then Bonn, where he completed his doctorate in 1998 and his Habilitation in 2005. Throughout his studies he worked in theaters, as a directorial assistant (“Regieassistent”) and later as dramaturge at the Schauspiel Frankfurt and the Theater an der Ruhr in Mülheim, a theater that played an important role in the development of migrant theater, especially Turkish-German theater, in the 1980s. (Mülheim, incidentally, is also the German city in which Brecht's Fatzer is set.) Besides writing journalistically for Der Spiegel, Die Zeit, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, among others, he is the author of an astounding variety of books. He authored creative prose works such as the children's book Ayda, Bär und Hase (2006) and novels such as Das Buch der von Neil Young Getöteten (2002), Dein Name (2011), or Große Liebe (2014). He wrote travel reports on his many voyages to the Middle East and North Africa that invite comparisons to the work of the Weimar-era “rasende Reporter” Egon Erwin Kisch. Kermani's journalistic writings and travel reports from regions in turmoil include the books Schöner neuer Orient: Berichte von Städten und Kriegen (2003) and Ausnahmezustand: Reisen in eine beunruhigte Welt (2013).